Some pilots may be "from Missouri," but the good ones are spiritual (or
literal) sons/daughters of West Virginia.

What is needed is for all of the rotary gurus to get together and do
some demonstrations at Oshkosh.  I don't mean flying -- people don't
think about engines when they look at wings -- but a coordinated display
of the capabilities and strengths of the rotary in relation to the
reciprosaur.

This will NOT be a "buy mine" show.  In fact, I propose that all of the
rotary gurus form the Rotary Aviation Alliance for the purposes of
promoting rotary power TOGETHER.  Show the BEST of rotary power, and
point out that there are several vendors and a few gurus, that it's not
a one-choice situation.  Provide catalogs or pamphlets from the various
vendors, but be there to demonstrate the TECHNOLOGY ("There are a number
of options, I think this one -- yes, this is the Atkins kit . . .").

Set up a pavilion show, or create your own "pavilion" where the
airplanes are, and gather as many rotary-powered birds as you can
("Oshkosh Rotary Roundup") with your demonstration on a raised stage.

Yank an engine out of a wrecked-rear RX-7 (on video, with witnesses) and
shove it into a sealed and signed case.  Take it out of the case at
Oshkosh, stick it on an engine stand and add plumbing.  Start it and get
it running smoothly, then DUMP THE COOLANT and cut off the water hoses
but LET IT KEEP RUNNING (don't shut it down until it fails or until the
show ends, if it goes that long)!  Have a big clock next to it counting
off the time until it fails, temp sensors, the whole test-bay setup.

With some reasonable publicity on, say, Saturday morning an hour after
the gates open, you can have a good-sized crowd there to watch the crate
being unsealed, engine mounted and started (this is only a 10-minute
job, done by two guys while a third makes the pitch:  "This video shows
up pulling the engine out of the car and putting it in the case . . .you
see that we haven't done anything to it . . .")

While the overheating engine is running, offer to let anyone stick a
reciprosaur next to it (put up another clock, marked "YOUR CURRENT
ENGINE" to make them think about what they're running now, and whether
it would take the abuse you're giving the rotary.

A couple of other displays would compare the two engine types, one being
a pile of all the moving parts in a reciprosaur, the other showing the
rotary innards.  This would be especially gripping if you find BROKEN
parts.  Your pitchman can hold them up and talk about "all of this stuff
that's not there to fail" in the rotary.

Have a completely disassembled rotary there for people to check out
("These are all of the parts to build the WHOLE ENGINE . . !").

Print out all of the thousands of NTSB aviation investigators' reports
of reciprosaur engine failures between 1975 and now, and bind them into
a book for visitors to read.  Do the same for all of the reports
mentioning the word "Mazda" (all 8 of them).  Point out that none of the
Mazda reports is of an engine flaw or a broken part (waving a busted
crankshaft in the air, or maybe a cylinder with a piston seized in it).

Meanwhile, you have that overheating RX engine running for all to see,
with the clock show how long it's been going (or how long it ran before
failing, if it has finally died).   Have a couple of heavy gloves for
visitors to put on and feel the lack of vibration.

THAT is how you get acceptance -- you make them worry about all those
fragile parts in their reciprosaurs while showing them the Promised
Land!  Show all of the costs to take an engine out of the car and get it
flying.  Show the rebuild parts kit and what it costs.  Compare these
costs to an O-320 purchase and rebuild.

If you think that the engine will run longer than a day, move up the day
that you start it.  Or maybe start one the first day at noon, and tear
it down after it fails then run another one for the weekend crowd.  Or
rebuild the first one in front of the crowd and give it another test!

The main thing is that the only rotaries that people see are parked, or
in a plane flying away.  Show it DOING ITS JOB where they can stand and
stare and ponder why they every thought they were better off with the
reciprosaur.

With all of the above said, I hereby volunteer to be the RAA "Rotary
Evangelist," if you and the other gurus want to set this up I can do the
planning and be the pitchman (I've done this kind of thing before and
know how to make it work).

Keith

-------------
Interesting concept, but I am reminded of what a former boss told me once "
If you don't think you will like the answer, don't ask the question" or a
parallel would be -- be sure you know what this will demonstrate before you
do it the first time in a pubic forum with audience. Russell Duffy had an
oil leak, and his engine seized in short order. I recall some with cooling
'failures' where they went on and landed, but they weren't 'total loss of
coolant', and had the coolant in the block to boil off, providing some
coolant for a 'get to the airport' portion of flight.

If I recall from Paul's newsletter, overheating a rotary will [could] result in
shrinkage of the aluminum housings on cool down, so you don't have to worry
about restarting the engine after the first cool down, that is if it hasn't
seized.

If one were going to do this, I would advocate a dry run prior to the
Oshkosh public demo -- then at least you would have some idea of what to
expect.
Bill Schertz
KIS Cruiser # 4045

I already thought about the oil issue, but figure that the stock-in-car
engine won't have a problem.  We'll drain it before pulling the thing
out of the car so it will have fresh oil for the demo.

However, even if the thing only runs an hour without water (which has
been done in at least one car that I know of), that's about 59 minutes
longer than any other water-cooled engine will do.

Essentially, I'm not promoting the idea of an engine which doesn't need
water so much as an engine which won't seize and kill you if you lose
the water inflight.  While I expect that it will stay running, this IS a
test-to-failure demo.  That's one reason for the big clock -- if the
engine fails, we stop the clock then challenge any other engine to match
the runtime.

Of course, we'll run a fan through the oil cooler and over the engine,
to simulate inflight airflow, and that should help a little.

Keith

Keith,
I guess it goes without saying, reducing the RPM will also help.
George ( down under)


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